1. Field of the Invention
The present invention concerns a decapper system, that is an apparatus for removing caps from tubular specimen containers.
As used herein, the term “container” means an article that contains a biological specimen and has a cap-closed tubular opening for access of the contents, e.g., a test tube.
2. Description of the Related Art
In automated clinical chemistry laboratories, in order to access the biological specimen in the container, it is necessary to remove the cap from the container.
There are known decapper machines for pressure cap only and decapper machines for screw cap only.
In the decapper machines it is important not only to remove the pressure or screw cap without damaging it but also to be able to operate with containers of different size.
In addition, there is the problem that the container is to be removed from its carrier for the cap removal operation and then repositioned into the carrier. This may cause the potential risk that the container is repositioned into a different carrier thereby jeopardizing the specimen identification process in those cases in which the specimen identification is made through the container carrier identification.